He beat some great teams on his way to the Finals, it seemed like once he made the Finals it was pretty much a guarantee he wasn't losing. The Knicks and Pistons (once he finally beat them) were big, physical teams that play a much different game than is played today. The Penny-Shaq Magic team he beat was probably the 2nd best team in the NBA at the time too. He beat Magic Johnson, Clyde Drexler and Charles Barkley led teams in his first three peat too. The Supersonics with Gary Payton and Shawn Kemp weren't too shabby either. That's where people go off the rails on this debate, in my opinion. LeBron has played tougher teams in the Finals, but he hasn't faced the competition on the way to the Finals overall like Jordan did.
Those Jazz teams were very good. It’s a shame Jordan was out the 2 years the Rockets were in the Finals. Those would have been epic.
Its a different game. Pull up 3s from 25 with no passes and nobody underneath wasnt a part of basketball. Its also a reason I turn it off, like when i saw Houston do it over and over. Ugly game now, which is why some of us that watched in 80s and 90s dont care for it. There is just nothing else on.
We all agree that Jordan faced tougher competition in the East. I’m saying that for most of that tough competition, either A) Jordan lost (first half of his career) or B) Jordan won when he had the better team, the way the Warriors have beaten tough Spurs/Rockets/Cavs/Thunder teams; those teams are good, but not as good as the Warriors. I’m just not seeing a time when he led his team to an impossible victory the way LeBron did in 2016.
The ugliness changes on a year-to-year basis as teams adjust. The Spurs and Warriors were playing gorgeous basketball just 3-4 years ago, then people started switching everything and now we’re back to iso mismatch ball. Offenses will probably counter that within a year or two (maybe with dominant post players who are also mobile) and the game will change again.
High profile sport with a lot of individual impact as far as winning goes. You take a LeBron quality football player, stick him on the Cleveland Browns, and they just suck a little less.
Mixes hand-eye with running and jumping, endurance. Games where most players have long breaks in action like football and baseball are a little different. Hockey has less raw athleticism on obvious dispay, with skill being at the forefront. Track is not the same as 60 or 48 min competitions... etc etc.
Football and basketball conditioning are just different. Going all out for ten seconds and then resting for 30 has its own challenges.
Julius Peppers is a good example. Freak athlete, hall of fame NFL player but a role player on UNC's basketball team. As good of a football player as he is, he didn't elevate the defenses he was on to elite levels
I think it also boils down to what people think of when they think of 'athlete'. Is Deion Sanders a better athlete than Jordan because he played two sports at the highest level where as Jordan couldn't even get out of AA baseball? But Jordan was the best basketball player of all time to many (I still pick Chamberlain). Ruth was a great hitter and pitcher, but lets face it, he wasn't going to win any track meets. Thorpe was really, really good at a lot of different activities, but probably wasn't the best in any of them, and so was a better all around athlete, and imho the best of all time. As it is in a lot of things in life, it all comes down to your point of view.
Basketball because players need good footwork, hand eye coordination, jumping, running, lateral quickness, while also dribbling, catching and shooting. Most football positions dont require all of those assets to perform well
Most need all of the first group. Second listing is specific to basketball. Most(all) basketball positions don't need to use hands to get off of 300 pounders, tackling, back pedaling, reading keys, etc. I think your elite edge rushers and LBs are some of the freakiest athletes in the world.
